


Luminary in a temple

by Potoo



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: M/M, Regeneration
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-09
Updated: 2015-04-09
Packaged: 2018-03-22 02:45:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,611
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3711871
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Potoo/pseuds/Potoo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Sun has brown hair and golden hair and black hair and red hair; the Sun's eyes are blue and brown and green and grey and black and everything in between. The Sun is human most often. </p>
<p>There are seventy-seven lives it meets its Sun.</p>
<p>When it wakes, it is bathed in light.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Luminary in a temple

“ _To love and be loved is to feel the sun from both sides._ ”   
― David Viscott

 

 

It knows that it remembers everything important.

It doesn't remember how it was born, doesn't remember its first life, doesn't remember if it was a little screaming boy or a little screaming girl, or maybe a little screaming puppy, a little mute sapling. It doesn't know what it is, in its core: is it a human being, an animal, a plant, a bacterium, a man, a woman, both, neither? It has been all of those and more, but its core, it doesn't know its core and doesn't know its own name. There are so many things it has forgotten, _that_ it knows – things that it will not be able to recall: memories that have been lost, moments that have pulsed and lived and died and are long gone, mothers and fathers and friends and lovers, their pretty faces, their kind words turned to dust by centuries oblivious to the void they leave behind.

Its birth, its parents, its home – all those things are insignificant, it thinks, because it was nothing before it met the Sun. All those lives, all those long, empty lives, this eternity spent in somber sobriety, are specks of sawdust coating desert sand.

There must have been lives before the Sun. It feels old and ancient. But its first memory, and its most important too, is one warm spring day.

It is a girl in that life, a young girl, her skin dark, her hair darker, and this girl has barely seen ten winters when she meets that which will become her reason to be. The Sun is shining bright in the sky, painted onto a blue sky, warm and endless in its magnificence. The girl basks in the Sun's glory, and swears to herself that she will never leave the sun. She does, in the end, break that promise, and dies with darkness on her face. It doesn't remember its name in this life.

It finds the Sun again two lives later, and that is when it realises that the Sun is so much grander than the bleak stars in the sky could ever hope to be. Because without the Sun, the world seems worn out and grey. In this life, it is a man grown, and the Sun is a man as well. They call the Sun Seneter, a common name; and they are brothers, and it is all he has ever wished for. It spends an eternity with its Sun, or maybe just the blink of an eye; but they work and live together until Seneter dies in the neighboring village, and it can't help its Sun, and it is left alone.

Three more bleak lives before they meet again, beneath the sun, and it is a girl again. The Sun'S hair is brown and fine, with eyes like granite; it cannot bear to look away. But the Sun is a strong warrior, and it is maimed, its left arm missing, unable to fight, and their paths do not cross for long. In this life, it dies, longing forever, searching for the Sun but never gaining another look at the Sun.

They meet again when it is an old man. This time, they speak for a whole afternoon. He tells his Sun – a young woman, her skin golden – that he misses celebrating. She consoles him with warmth in her voice before she stands and leaves him, to make the world a better place. It gazes after her. The Sun will never be satisfied with the world, it knows, and loves until its heart bursts.

It is glad to be of help to its Sun, even as its Sun whips it and tells it to go faster. It would like to tell its Sun that it can't go faster, but it is a horse this time and it can barely grasp the joy of having its Sun on its back. Yet that is the life it understands that the Sun is fallible. It loves the Sun more for it. The Sun's name is Decimus, its own name is Gloria.

The Sun has brown hair and golden hair and black hair and red hair; the Sun's eyes are blue and brown and green and grey and black and everything in between. The Sun is human most often, but once, it remembers finding its Sun on the street, a bird with blood painting its wings red, chattering angrily, and it has taken the bird home. It nurses it back to health, and the memory of a blue bird flying far away, into the wilderness, and never returning, is one of its favorite memories. The Sun's name is Ион then, but it doesn't remember its own name.

There are seventy-seven lives it meets its Sun – sometimes, they're family, sometimes they become friends, sometimes it is told stories about the Sun and just _knows_ it's the Sun, sometimes it sees the Sun across a river and can't run fast enough (those are the worst- -), sometimes it kisses the Sun, sometimes (but rarely) the Sun hates it, sometimes (but rarely) the Sun loves it: most often, it is just not important to the Sun, sometimes they touch, sometimes they spend years together; once, they have sex, and once the Sun kills it, but it isn't angry about that. Once, they almost die together: the Sun burns but doesn't scream, and it kills itself when it sees the dark remains of its Sun's body. Most of the lives are miserable, but there are some it enjoys – those when the Sun _sees_ it, when it is either hated or loved.

Its most favorite life, it thinks, is when the Sun is a very young woman, with sadness wavering around her pupils but the endless fire in ancient eyes not extinguished. It is her daughter then, short black hair and small black eyes, and even though it dies after three years and has not fully grasped who it is, who the young woman is, it is one of the rare lives it is loved by its God, and loved in a capacity it hasn't thought possible before. The Sun's name is Mayari and its own name is Sali.

It is loved, too, in another life. It is a painful life, with so much misery it can hardly bear it until it meets its Sun – but when it sees hair spun of sunlight and eyes burning through its skin, it remembers everything. It is not a horse in this life, or a child, it is useless, and it is the first life it feels its age, old and worn and threadbare, and it cannot muster the strength to help its Sun, continuing to blaze so brilliantly after all those centuries. It is worn out, but its Sun will never be, so it is understandable that the Sun doesn't look at it twice. They're both men in this life, and they talk with each other, and it's almost fun, almost pleasant.

  
  


It is the first time they die together, and it holds its Sun's hand and feels that impossible fire burning it down to its bones, and it won't let go again. It doesn't even notice the bullets. The Sun's name is Enjolras, it remembers, and its own name is Grantaire.

  
  


When it wakes, it is bathed in light. It closes its eyes and opens them again and realizes that its Sun is by its side, and they're both standing, or lying on the ground, it isn't sure, isn't certain if there is a floor, doesn't know where they are, only that its Sun is by its side and holdings its hand and everything is bright. They are floating in nothingness.

It is so, so happy. The Sun, still in the form of that young blond man, remains smiling. Their fingers are entwined, their eyes are locked on each other, their hearts are not beating. This is the end, it thinks, it won't have to live and die without laying eyes on its God ever again, this is the end: this is where they will live, exist, stars, sublime, forever, and there will be no fear, no hate, no anger. Its Sun smiles and holds its hand and then they are embracing and dancing, from the nothingness through the dark sky, and this is the end. This is the end. It could not be happier, and it cries, and its Sun smiles and everything is perfect. They spend an eternity among the stars.

  
  


This is the end.

  
  


Then, it is born again, a pink screaming baby, among blood and shit and tears, and doesn't remember the eternity with its Sun, doesn't remember the dance, the death. It remembers the lives, all of them, remembers loneliness and darkness and desperation, a few stolen glances and a few mild touches, but the eternity it spent happy is forgotten by the newborn.

  
  


Lives are important. There is nothing but life and it is alive and there is nothing it has forgotten, remembers everything important– everything–

It knows that it remembers everything important. Everything. There is nothing it has forgotten, even though it feels as if it has forgotten _everything_.

It looks for its Sun. That's what it does, that's what it has always done, that's what it must do. It will find its Sun, it must find its Sun. It misses something, anything, everything.

It can't find the Sun. Not in this life, not in the next, not after that, not, not, never– _we held hands_ , it thinks, _we died together–_

_We danced together–_

No–

It can't find its Sun.

There is no end.

**Author's Note:**

> What is this? 
> 
> We just don't know. 
> 
> I wrote about 70% of this a week after I first got into the Les Mis fandom. I just now discovered it and decided to finish it, polish it, and remove if from my "Unfinished!!!!" folder.


End file.
